


don't leave the room (until i come back from the dead for you)

by theinvisibledisaster



Series: It's a Love Story After All [1]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant to 6x04, Canon Divergent past that point, Canon Speculation, Mid-Season Speculation, POV Bellamy Blake, The 100 (TV) Season 6, Worried Bellamy, but not really because it's Too Blarkey for TV, post 6x04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-25
Updated: 2019-05-25
Packaged: 2020-03-17 04:49:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18958213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theinvisibledisaster/pseuds/theinvisibledisaster
Summary: Bellamy finds out what happened to Clarke after the party.He doesn't take it well.





	don't leave the room (until i come back from the dead for you)

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by [@fen-ha-fuck-you](https://fen-ha-fuck-you.tumblr.com/) and the massive paragraph of spec she wrote about what Bellamy would do when he finds out about Josephine!Clarke, coupled with the comment from Bob about this season Bellamy being a lot closer to s1!Bellamy - more rash, thinking more with his heart etc. 
> 
> It ended up with more plot that just a drabble, because at this point I'm convinced I'm incapable of writing anything shorter than 3k, but I've been in a writing funk for the last couple of weeks, so honestly I'm pretty excited to have written anything at all. 
> 
> Title comes from the poem [You Are Jeff](http://youngerpoets.yupnet.org/2008/04/17/you-are-jeff-crush-by-richard-siken/) by Richard Siken, it's a completely fucking bonkers poem, but it's beautiful and sad and wonderful. 
> 
> I apologise in advance for the angst, but that's par for the course with me, so
> 
> I hope y'all enjoy it!

“See you tonight,” Clarke murmured, smiling coyly at him, and as she left, her fingers snagged on a lock of her hair and she made to twirl it around her fingers. She seemed to catch herself and quickly dropped her hand to her pocket, but Bellamy had already seen it.

It jolted him; the small movement was so unfamiliar, so unrecognisable from the woman he knew, that he found himself staring blankly at her back as she walked away.

Murphy, who had been lying lazily across one of the chairs, lifted his head the second the door closed behind her. “Did you see that?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s not like her.”

Bellamy shook his head, swallowing. “That’s not her.”

Murphy sat up, scrambling to his feet. “We don’t know that.”

“Yes we do.” He didn’t want to think about it, he didn’t want to admit it, but he had no choice. “We’ve already seen it here. Delilah isn’t her anymore, and we know that the Primes are nightbloods, and that Russell knows that Clarke is one. Whatever they’ve done to her, it’s messing with her head, it’s not her.”

He scrubbed a hand through his hair, trying to remember how to exhale the breath he’d been holding since Clarke left the room. He couldn’t just fly off the handle the way he would have done so many years ago. He was older now – wiser – and he had to be smart about this. Maybe this was an A.L.I.E situation and all they needed to do was remove a chip. Maybe he was blowing it all out of proportion, and the people meant Clarke no harm at all.

Clarke had always been his blind spot – he knew that.

“Okay.” Murphy clapped a hand to his shoulder. “So what’s the plan?”

 _“Now_ you’re helping? This morning you were content to just ignore everything and everyone, but all of a sudden you want to get involved?” Bellamy levelled a stern gaze at him.

He fidgeted uncomfortably, looking down at the floor, before he said, “It’s Clarke, man.”

Bellamy sighed in defeat. “Yeah. It’s Clarke.”

Jordan appeared in the doorway, a steely look in his eye and his jaw set in a way Bellamy had never expected to see from the cheery man. He hadn't even realised Jordan had been eavesdropping, but the kid was resolute as he started towards the palace, raising his eyebrows at them over his shoulder, “What are we still here for? Let’s go.”

 

* * *

* * *

* * *

 

There was nothing – not in the classrooms, nor the gardens, nor the main hall – but he never really expected there to be. The things people wanted to keep hidden were never right out in the open, even in a place as ostentatious as this. He and Murphy had spent enough time in places that lived beneath a veneer for them to be used to it by now, but this was Jordan’s first time dealing with something like this, and he was starting to get antsy.

“Why are they doing this?” He asked, when they finished searching through yet another room and came up with nothing.

“I don’t know,” Bellamy said honestly. “But we’re gonna figure it out, okay? We just need to be smart about this, work together.”

“Together?” A familiar voice said, and he turned to find Clarke leaning against the nearest wall, a curl wrapped around her finger as she surveyed the three of them. She raised an eyebrow, “Doing what?”

Murphy shrugged. “We’re starting a boyband.”

“Ah, makes sense,” she nodded sarcastically, amused, and waved a hand at their surroundings. “Planning on finding any instruments here in the kitchen, or?”

“Looking for inspiration, Princess,” Murphy flashed a wolfish grin, “although now that you’re here, I’m beginning to feel a love song coming on.”

“Cute, but don’t you have a girlfriend?” She asked teasingly. The atmosphere in the room shifted and suddenly Murphy was like the Murphy of a few days ago, hackles raised.

“I don’t know, do I?” He growled, and Bellamy shot him a warning look, but he glared back, unreachable in his frustration.

Her face fell into a frown and she tilted her head at him. “You okay there?”

“Peachy,” he bit out, practically grinding his teeth.

“Cool it, Murphy,” Bellamy said, shaking his head.

“I’m always cool, Blake,” he snapped back.

“Well, that’s debatable,” Clarke shot back on Bellamy’s behalf, and she sounded so much like herself that for half a second, he almost believed that nothing was wrong, that he really had been overreacting.

Then Russell Lightbourne walked in.

And Clarke caught his eye, and released the hair she’d been pulling, almost on instinct.

And Bellamy _knew._

He knew that wasn’t his Clarke.

“What have you done to her?” He asked quietly. It sounded loud in the small space.

Russell tilted his head at him congenially, hands folding over themselves in the practiced motion of a politician. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Mr Blake.”

He took a slow, measured breath. Counted his heartbeats. Maintained careful eye contact. “I want you to know that I am being calm. I’m not shooting you, or punching you, or strangling you. I want you to know that this is me being restrained, because Clarke wouldn’t want me to do it any other way. But if you don’t tell me exactly what you’ve done to her, I can’t promise I won’t kill you where you stand. So I’m going to ask you again; what have you done to her?”

There was something in Russell’s eyes – a flicker of uncertainty – and Bellamy knew he had him.

“I promise you, Mr Blake, I have not harmed Miss Griffin–”

“That’s not what I asked.”

“No harm could possibly come to Miss Gri –”

Murphy stepped forward and shoved Russell backwards. He hit the wall hard and Murphy fisted his hand in Russell’s shirt and yanked at it even as he kept him pinned. “I’m not as zen as Bellamy, so I suggest you answer his damn question.”

“I… I don’t–”

 _“Answer him!”_   He reached for the gun at his belt. 

“Leave him alone.” Clarke said evenly, and their heads all swivelled in her direction. She sighed. “Tell them, Dad.”

“Dad?” Jordan asked, eyes wide.

Russell slumped, but he was looking at Clarke when he answered. “Sweetheart, this isn’t what we planned for.”

“He’s hurting, Dad, can’t you see that?” She gestured at Bellamy. “He needs to know. Wouldn’t you rather _know,_ than spend the rest of your life agonising over it?”

“Alright, Mr Blake,” Russell began, holding his hands up in surrender. Murphy stepped back, but he didn’t go far. Something like regret crossed Russell’s features. “You’re right, that isn’t Clarke Griffin, not anymore. The same ceremony that was performed on Delilah was performed on the woman you used to know. Neither of those women exist anymore. Their bodies are simply vessels for the consciousness of our Primes.”

And just like that, the floor fell out of Bellamy’s world.

Gone, just like that.

Yet somehow, Russell was still talking.

“Clarke was… Cillian had tried to kidnap her, using the paralytic that was used on Delilah, and when we prevented it, I realised that we had the perfect sacrifice, right there, within our grasp. A woman with royal blood who no-one had noticed was missing. We had lost our daughter, but we could get her back in minutes, and all we had to do was… was murder an innocent girl. She felt no pain, that I can swear to you. I promised her that she was doing the right thing, before she died. I gave her closure, told her that she would finally get the peace she had been longing for. She died quietly, and my daughter’s consciousness was inserted into her body.”

He wanted to throw up.

He was dying, he was certain of it.

He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t move, he couldn’t do anything except die.

Die like she did.

He was dimly aware that Murphy had stumbled against a table and was barely holding himself up, and that Jordan was shaking his head and crying silently, but he couldn’t move.

_Breathe._

_Count your heartbeats._

_Close your eyes._

_Open them._

The routine he’d established on the Ring for keeping his temper in check and the panic at bay wasn’t working.

_Breathe._

_Count your heartbeats._

_Close your eyes._

_Open them._

The floor was gone and his world was crumbling and Clarke Griffin was dead. She died. She died _again,_ and he couldn’t save her. He failed her, he lost her, she was dead.

_Breathe._

Dead.

_Count your heartbeats._

Dead.

_Close your eyes._

Dead.

He opened them, only to come face to face with the woman he loved, whose face was seared into his mind with the force of a nuclear wave, and he hated it, hated her. Because he could tell it wasn’t her – her expression was too relaxed, her mouth didn’t carry that permanent shrug that Clarke’s did, her eyebrows didn’t seem to want to draw together in thought – she might be wearing her face but she wasn’t Clarke Griffin.

“Who the hell are you?” Murphy croaked out from somewhere to Bellamy’s left. Or was it his right? He had no idea.

The floor was gone.

Clarke Griffin was dead.

“Josephine,” she said, eyes crinkling with something akin to pity as she looked between the three of them. “Josephine Lightbourne. I’m so sorry for your loss.”

“You’re… you’re _sorry?”_   Murphy said in disbelief. _“You’re **sorry?!”**_

She took a hesitant step back, moving in a way Clarke had never done. “I… I…”

“You’re walking around inside the body of a woman your father murdered in cold blood, and you’re _SORRY?!”_

He launched himself forward, throwing Josephine and himself to the floor. Her head cracked against the ground and she cried out in pain, but Murphy wasn’t going to let that stop him. He leaned on her throat, pressing down so that she couldn’t make another sound, no breath left in her lungs.

Bellamy grabbed him by the shirt and hauled him up and off her. “That’s enough, that’s _enough!_ Clarke wouldn’t… she wouldn’t want us to do this.”

“I’m not letting her walk around with her face, Bellamy. It’s disgusting, it’s not right, it’s…”

“It’s done.” Russell said calmly, adjusting his sleeve. “I apologise, but your friend is dead. It is done and it cannot be undone.”

“You’re monsters.” Jordan whispered. “You killed Delilah; you killed the people who used to be the bodies you’re in?”

“It is our way. It always has been.”

“And as we all know, the old ways always work,” Murphy snapped sarcastically.

“The Primes know what is fated to them.”

“Clarke didn’t.” Bellamy said, voice hoarse and the world still spinning around him. He closed his eyes again, using his pain and rage to focus himself, the way he used to do back when he first set foot on Earth. When he opened them again, his vision felt tinged with red, the way it had been during the eclipse. “Clarke didn’t know. She was paralysed. She died frozen, unable to fight back, helpless and alone. She died alone.”

_Breathe._

She died alone.

_Count your heartbeats._

She died alone, alone, _alone, alone, alone **alonealone-**_

“Bellamy, Bellamy, _breathe_ man, just breathe.” Murphy’s voice broke through his panic, and someone was gripping his shoulders. He realised that they were all staring at him. But it was Josephine’s eyes that caught his. She was standing in front of him, fingers on his neck, shaking her head sympathetically. There was no understanding whatsoever in her gaze of what he’d lost. Of who he’d lost. She’d rushed to help him because she thought it was the right thing to do, not because she was Clarke and it was instinctual. Not because she was Clarke and she _cared._

She seemed to realise that she’d overstepped, and quickly moved away from him, closer to her father. Bellamy stumbled back and Murphy caught his elbow to stop him from collapsing.

“You good?” Jordan asked from his other side.

He shook his head frantically, tears already spilling down his cheeks.

“I can’t…” He sobbed. “I can’t do it again. I can’t lose her again, I’m not strong enough.”

“Bellamy…” Murphy murmured.

“No, I _can’t._ I can’t do it. She died _alone,_ Murphy. _Again._ I failed her again, and she died, again. She died afraid and alone and unable to move and there is nothing that we can do to save her. There’s nothing we can do to make that better. She’s gone, and I… I didn’t even get to say goodbye. AGAIN.” He swept an arm across the nearest flat surface, sending things rocketing to the floor. “I lost her, Murphy. I loved– Murphy, I lost her and I never told her, not once. I never… I never…”

He was spiralling again, he could feel it coming, but before it could take hold, Josephine caught his eye again. But this time there was something different about it. She lifted her hand to her cheek, eyebrows drawing together slightly in confusion. She shook her head a little, like she was trying to dislodge something, and then she gasped in a breath.

“Josephine?” Russell enquired.

She clutched at her head, crying out in pain.

“Josephine, my baby, talk to me, what’s wrong?”

Her lashes fluttered and she took a single, shaky step towards him. She looked frightened, unbalanced, and her eyes were darting every which way. She looked possessed. Something wasn’t right.

When she spoke, it sounded small, childlike. “Dad?”

Her eyes rolled back in her head and she dropped like a stone, seizing as she fell.

She didn’t hit the floor, however.

Bellamy caught her on instinct, the way he always would, and he slowly lowered her to the ground, cradling her in his arms. He didn’t know what to do or how to fix this, he just knew that he couldn’t let Clarke die on her own again – even if it was Josephine.

Russell crouched down beside them, hands hovering over her. He looked just as frantic and lost as Bellamy felt; watching his daughter trapped inside a seizing body while Bellamy held her.

“I’ve got you,” Bellamy whispered, rocking slightly as he curled his arms even tighter around her, pressing his lips against her forehead. “I’ve got you, Princess. I’m not going anywhere.”

Her body went limp.

For just a moment, the room was filled with nothing but Bellamy’s laboured breaths, heavy with tears, and then, like a miracle, she moved.

He loosened his grip enough to see her face, and her eyes snapped open to see Russell. She held his gaze before it shifted, finding Bellamy, and she exhaled slightly, eyes creasing in the corners.

She spoke.

Just one word.

But it was enough.

_“Bellamy.”_

He choked back a tortured mix between a laugh and a sob, brushing her hair back from her face and holding her close. He could feel her shallow breathing against the crook of his neck and he sobbed into her shoulder, clutching at her to reassure himself that she was really there.

“Oh my god.” Jordan said, sliding to the ground, relieved.

“She’s alive.” Murphy breathed. “I knew it. I knew she couldn’t be the first of us to go to hell. She’s a cockroach, like me. She doesn’t get to die. Not Clarke.”

“Didn’t know you had any optimism left, Murphy.” A familiar wry voice uttered, muffled against Bellamy’s shirt, but still loud enough to fill the room.

“Oh, you dick, I hate you,” Murphy sobbed, dropping to his knees next to them so he could grip Clarke’s hand in his own. “Don’t do that to me, Griffin, I mean it. One dead Clarke was already too many. Okay?”

“I’ll do my level best not to die next time,” she mumbled, squeezing his palm.

Bellamy laughed into her collarbone, tears dripping down his cheeks and soaking into her shirt and her skin, but she didn’t seem to mind, bringing her free arm up to scrunch his shirt tightly, as if reassuring herself that he was there, that she was alive.

“What happened in there, how are you still alive?” Jordan asked.

Bellamy sat back a little so that Clarke could speak to them properly, and in the process, she moved to sit up, taking her own weight on her arms. But before she could answer Jordan’s question, Russell leaned forward, hand closing urgently around Clarke’s forearm.

“Where is she? What happened to Josephine?” And he was so worried, so _earnest,_ so completely genuine, that something inside of Bellamy just… snapped.

“What happened to _Josephine?”_   He asked, low and menacing. Clarke crawled onto her knees and reached for him, trying to calm him down, but he was too far gone for that now.

Murphy tugged her out of the way just in time, as Bellamy surged up and forward, grabbing Russell by the throat and throwing him down against the nearest table. He swung his fist, clocking Russell hard across the face, and then he did it again. And again. And again. And again.

_Breathe._

Punch.

_Count your heartbeats._

Punch.

_Close your eyes._

Punch.

_Open them._

Punch.

“–amy! Bellamy!” A voice broke through his rage-induced fog. Her voice. It was always her voice. “Bellamy, stop! Stop it, you’re _killing him!”_

Punch.

“C’mon man, you’re not this. Don’t let him make you into this.” That was Murphy.

He shook his head and snarled in response, gripping tighter to Russell’s throat and watching his skin start to blotch as he ran out of air.

“Bellamy,” she said again, catching his arm when he pulled it back to swing again. “We’re supposed to be different here: better. If you keep doing that, you’re gonna kill him.”

“HE KILLED _YOU!”_ He bellowed.

Just like that, all the fight went out of him. He released Russell and stepped back so that Murphy could restrain him. He was vaguely aware that at some point, Clarke had sent Jordan to get help, but the only thing that felt real was the black blood dripping from his knuckles, and the heartbeat pounding through his empty chest.

All the rage and panic and pain was gone, and he was left with only the dull, aching emptiness of loss and guilt.

 _“He killed you,_ Clarke.” He whispered. “He took you away from us.”

She reached for him, fingers curling around his bicep to hold herself up, and to remind him that she was okay. “I know. I was there. And the last thing I thought before it all went black was that I hoped you lived a good life. I hoped you took care of my daughter and you lived a good life. If you kill Russell, you start a war with these people. I’m not letting you do that–”

“–Clarke, need I remind you; we have done far worse–”

“–listen to me.” She snapped. He ducked his head, conceding, and she gravitated closer. “I’m not letting you do that _alone.”_

He stared at her, gobsmacked. She stared defiantly right back. He sniffed, feeling the tears return, but she anticipated them before he did and stepped into his space, wrapping her arms around him. He brought his up around her, tangling one of his hands in her hair and burying his face into the crook of her neck, breathing her him.

She was alive.

Again.

He held her a little tighter.

_Breathe._

_Count your heartbeats._

_Close your eyes._

_Open them._

When he did, Echo, Raven, Miller and Emori were standing in the entrance, faces contorted in shock at the scene surrounding them. He sighed, extricating himself from Clarke’s arms and holding her at arm’s length, raking his gaze over her.

“You okay?” He asked.

“No.” She admitted, a single tear sliding down to her chin. She didn’t bother wiping it away. “I thought I died, then I realised I was stuck in my own head, reliving every decision I’ve ever made, and I fought my way out, but I think… I think I trapped Josephine in there. She’s still alive in my head, Bellamy.”

“What the hell do you mean, in your head?” Raven limped over, expression harsh when she directed it at Clarke.

“I mean, in my head.” She responded tiredly.

“Everybody back up,” Jordan ordered, “Clarke just came back from the dead, give her some air.”

“That would require Bellamy moving more that two inches from her and that’s not gonna happen,” Murphy pointed out.

“I just need to sit down for a minute, I’ll be fine.” Clarke waved a hand, like it was nothing.

“Will someone please explain to us what the hell just happened?!” Miller asked.

“And why Russell is tied up and bleeding over there?” Echo asked.

“And how Clarke could possibly have come back from the dead?!” Emori added, for emphasis.

Bellamy shrugged. “It’s been a long day.”

“It’s midday.” Miller grumbled.

Jordan whistled in surprise.

“Excellent.” Murphy grinned. “Lunchtime. And lo and behold, we’re in a kitchen. Time for more of my world-famous cooking, eh Princess?”

Clarke didn’t say anything, just nodded, completely exhausted, and half-crumpled against Bellamy’s side. He slipped an arm around her shoulders to keep her standing. No-one objected to it, and even Raven was holding her tongue as Bellamy led Clarke to the nearest comfortable-looking chair. He set her down gently and she sagged against it, tugging at a lock of hair that had fallen in her face.

He pulled her hand away. “Don’t… don’t do that.” He pleaded softly.

She seemed to realise the movement she’d been mimicking and dropped both of her palms face down into her lap.

He stroked her hair back from her face himself, only letting his fingers linger for a moment. It felt familiar, and it made his chest ache. Clarke’s eyes were drifting shut, but he needed her to hear it before she slipped into unconsciousness.

“You’re my family too, Clarke.” He whispered.

She didn’t reply, already asleep.

He didn’t know what the hell he was gonna do now. All he knew was that he had Clarke back, and that when she woke, they would figure it out together.

_Breathe._

_Count your heartbeats._

_Close your eyes._

_Open them._

**Author's Note:**

> Thoughts?
> 
> Comments water my children and feed my crops. <3


End file.
